Tradition building and cultural competition in Southern Song China (1160-1220): The way, the learning, and the texts.
详细信息
文摘
This dissertation deals with Daoxue, the initial phase of Neo-Confucianism, as a newly established intellectual tradition and argues that the rise of Daoxue should be understood as the success of an ongoing tradition-building process in a culturally competitive context. Three aspects are emphasized to provide foci for understanding the meanings of the intellectual tradition and the cultural competition in a historical context: the Way (Dao) as the ground of intellectual values, learning (xue) as the practice by which to approach and realize the Way, and finally the texts (wen) as the materialization of the Way, which were produced and transmitted during the process of learning, and also as a media through which the literati reached out to other contemporary literati as well as to a general audience in society.;The time period on which this dissertation focuses is from 1160 to 1220, a period recognized as the second flourishing of Daoxue, which was followed by the second political persecution. The following individuals are discussed through the dissertation as the main body of research: Cheng Yi and Zhu Xi as the founders of the Daoxue tradition; Hu Anguo, Hu Yin, Hu Hong, Zhang Shi, and Lyu Zuqian representing different degrees and kinds of affiliating relationships with Daoxue; Lu Jiuyuan and Chen Liang as the opponents from the local society; Xue Jixuan, Chen Fuliang, and Ye Shi as another contemporary intellectual group which had a more complicated relationship to the rising Daoxue group.;This dissertation will provide a more nuanced and dynamic view of the tradition than that which has been uncritically assumed in much of the current scholarship. It will balance and supplement current explanations of the rise of Daoxue: the insiders' view that suggests that the power of truth or the excellence of thought was the main factor which led to the dominance of Daoxue; or the political historians' view that the rise of Daoxue should mainly be attributed to political circumstances. In contrast to the insiders' view, this dissertation also focuses on intellectual activities as well as intellectual products to explain the strength of Daoxue; to the political historians' view, this dissertation shows that the political conditions did not necessarily dominate literati decisions on their intellectual goals and the contents of their learning. Finally, this dissertation also specifies some common intellectual concerns and issues which lead us into a deeper understanding of the literati culture of the Southern Song.